Take the Lombre Home (Japanese: ソルロックとハスブレロ！聖なる森の伝説！Solrock and Hasubrero! Legend of the Forest!) is the 63rd episode of the Advanced Generation series, and the 337th episode of the Pokémon anime. It was first broadcast in Japan on February 12, 2004 and in the United States on January 29, 2005.

Contents

Blurb

Ash and friends are headed to Petalburg City so he can earn his fifth Gym badge. They fall into yet another Team Rocket scheme to steal Pikachu but are saved by a wild Solrock.

The kids arrive at a nearby village where the stream has completely dried up. They send out their Water-type Pokémon to search for water, and Brock's Lotad falls into the empty well. When he pulls it back up, the Pokémon evolves into Lombre. An old woman runs out and calls it their "Water Lord."

Her granddaughter Mary explains that they receive their water from a stream flowing out of a Lombre shrine, which dried up shortly after a meteorite fell to earth. Solrock has been spotted in the woods since then, so they blame it for the drought.

The villagers perform a rain dance with Lombre, and many wild Pokémon join in. Ash and friends use Lombre's dance to draw Solrock out, but May's Skitty runs off toward a cave. When May and Mary explore the cave, they discover a machine built by Team Rocket siphoning water from the stream.

A battle begins, and Solrock ends up using Ember to protect the villagers from Team Rocket's attacks. Pikachu sends the villains blasting off again, while Solrock continues to burn. Brock's Lombre and Mudkip cool down Solrock with their Water Gun attacks, and the steam creates a rainstorm.

The villagers decide to worship Solrock instead, while Ash and friends depart for Petalburg.

Plot

Ash, Brock, Max, and May continue their journey back to Petalburg City so that Ash can win his next Badge when the gang realizes that they are out of water. Thankfully, Brock has a plan. There is a fresh water spring nearby that is among the world's most famous.

Meanwhile, Jessie, James, and Meowth are setting up another trap at the spring. They see Ash and the gang coming, so they hide and wait. Max and May are nervous, which is only made worse by a Zubat that flies out of a nearby bush, scaring the group. Then they're distracted by a Solrock floating nearby. That's when the trap is sprung and Ash and the others find themselves at the bottom of a hole. Team Rocket emerge victorious from their hiding place and grab Pikachu out of the hole with a net.

A Flamethrower suddenly knocks over Team Rocket, making them drop Pikachu back in the hole. It turns out to be the Solrock who decided to help. While Team Rocket is busy, Ash and the others manage to climb out of the hole. Ash discovers from his Pokédex that Solrock can read people's minds.

James has Cacnea use Pin Missile on Solrock, but to no effect. Solrock angrily responds with a SolarBeam and sends Team Rocket blasting off again. When the smoke clears, Solrock has disappeared.

With Team Rocket and Solrock gone, the gang decide to continue to the spring, only to discover that the spring is empty. May notices a village, so the group decide to head down their in the hopes that they have water. As they get closer, they realize that the town is empty, and the river that runs through the town is gone too.

Ash sends out Corphish because Water-type Pokémon can smell and find water if it is close. Brock has Lotad and Mudkip do the same. Skitty comes out of its Poké Ball wanting to help out too.

Corphish immediately starts digging in the river bed, while the other three Pokémon take off in another direction. As Corphish continues digging, it finds a large pot and flips the pot upside down so Corphish can use it as a shell. Ash realizes it wasn't actually digging for water, despite his instructions.

Mudkip finds a well, but it appears dried up. Lotad hops up onto a bucket as if to say something, but it just looses its balance and falls into the well. Thankfully Brock manages to pull it back up without a problem. Suddenly Lotad begins to evolve and it becomes a Lombre.

An old woman runs up excited to see Lombre and explains that whenever hardship falls on their town, the "Great Water Lord" Lombre shows himself. The old woman is convinced that the Solrock and bad luck it brings is to blame and calls out some other people from one of the houses. One of them is Mary, the old woman's granddaughter, whom Brock immediately falls in love with.

Mary doesn't seem to share her grandmother's belief that it is the Solrock's fault, and brings the gang inside for some water. Mary explains that there is a water shortage because the source of their water, the spring that Ash and his friends found earlier, is no longer running. The spring is believed to be where the Great Lombre Water Lord lives.

The villagers think the shortage has something to do with a meteorite they saw crash near the Great Lombre's shrine, and since then a Solrock has been wandering around the area. Since then no rain has fallen, all of which makes people think it is the Solrock's fault. Mary's disagrees and is convinced that there has to be an alternate explanation.

Outside, the villagers have begun doing a Rain Dance in hopes of driving away what they believe to be an evil Solrock and end the drought. Ash defends Solrock by explaining that it saved his Pikachu. Mary continues by saying that the villagers should further investigate what might be stopping the water, but her grandmother believes that that would just anger the Water Lord. Tired of arguing, Mary's grandmother starts up the Rain Dance again.

Lombre loves the dancing and starts dancing too, which excites the villagers. Pikachu starts to get excited by it too, and soon Bellossom, Oddish, Seedot, and Shroomish emerge from the bushes to start dancing as well. All of it to no avail, as there continues to be not a cloud in the sky, though the villagers don't seem to mind. Mary is incredibly frustrated with this since there doesn't seem to be any point in doing the dance if it doesn't work.

Ash thinks that the villagers should keep dancing in the hopes that the Solrock will show up like the other wild Pokémon. Brock, however, points out that since Solrock can read minds, it probably won't go to a place where there are a bunch of people angry at it.

Brock comes up with a solution though, and has Lombre just dance on his own while all the villagers leave, that way Solrock wouldn't be scared away. Sure enough this works, as Solrock soon joins Lombre.

As the two Pokémon start having a conversation, Skitty suddenly comes out of its Pokémon and runs off into the forest, with May quickly following. Mary joins the chase and soon Skitty goes into a cave, which thankfully Mary knows very well. Skitty is found quickly, as well as the thing that Skitty found: a pump that has been pumping out all of the villagers' water.

It turns out that Team Rocket is on the other side of the pump, filling water bottles in the hopes of making tons of money selling them. Wobbuffet pops out of its Poké Ball and spots Lombre and Solrock, so Team Rocket decides to try to steal the two Pokémon too.

Meanwhile, Solrock has begun dancing with Lombre. Mary's grandmother believes that if Solrock is allowed to dance, the village will be cursed with even more sunlight, so she rounds up the villagers and they charge at Solrock. Solrock stops them and levitates them with Confusion, but Ash and Lombre convince Solrock to put them down.

Just as Mary, May, and Skitty make it back to start warning everyone about Team Rocket, they emerge out of the ground with a new robot to steal Lombre and Solrock, but Brock has Lombre use Razor Leaf to cut through the net that the trio launched at them. Pikachu launches a Thunderbolt but the move fails when Team Rocket blasts a stream of water at them.

Team Rocket continues the stream of water and attempts to blast the villagers, but Solrock blocks the water with its body, and as Brock points out: Solrock should be weak against water since it's a Rock-type. The villagers are in amazement that Solrock saved them. Solrock is giving off so much heat that the water doesn't phase it, and tackles Team Rocket's robot. Pikachu tries another Thunderbolt and this time sends Team Rocket blasting off again.

Unfortunately Solrock is giving off so much power that it can't control itself to the point where it turns into a floating fireball and starts heading straight for the village. To stop it, Lombre and Mudkip use Water Gun, and all the steam being given off by the two attacks creates clouds in the sky. Soon the rain clouds are thick in the sky and it begins to rain, and the spring begins to fill up again.

Now that the villagers' lives are back to normal, they begin to give thanks to Lombre, but then announce that Solrock is the new Sacred Guardian of their spring. Mary is at least thankful that they changed their minds about Solrock, and the gang continue their journey to Petalburg City.

Despite Pokémon water being implied as unsafe to drink, the rainwater drank at the end of the episode is actually just the water from Lombre and Mudkip after going through evaporation and condensation. This water would still be unsafe to drink.